PopWatch Poll: What's your favorite primate movie?

With just a few more days until monkeys overrule us all with their strength and enviable memory skillsRise of the Planet of the Apes (primate pun alert!) swings into theaters, we got to thinking about our all-time favorite monkey movies. While it’s long been acknowledged that monkeys = comedy gold (see: Every Which Way But Loose, this video), chimps have an even better track record on the big screen in drama, sci-fi, and action films.

Since we don’t know where Rise of the Planet of The Apes will rank in the pantheon of all-time great monkey movies (we will, however, venture to guess it will be high above Ed and Dunston Checks In) we want to know which flick you’ve gone bananas over in the past.

It’s hard to top the end-all, be-all of chimps, King Kong, both in the classic 1933 original and especially in Peter Jackson’s masterful 2005 re-telling. Then again, there’s the original 1968 version of The Planet of the Apes (sorry, Tim Burton), which includes the single greatest angry-at-monkeys line in cinema history.

Of course, just like here on planet Earth, there’s a whole bunch of different species in the movie chimp world: There’s documentary monkeys (2011’s Project Nim), Bill Paxton-befriending monkeys (1998’s Mighty Joe Young), and human-raising monkeys (1984’s Greystoke: The Legend of Tarzan).

Still, there may be no movie that pays better homage or gives love to monkeys quite like 1988’s inspiring Gorillas in the Mist does. The film, which tells the amazing — albeit, tear jerking — story of zoologist Dian Fossey (played by an Oscar-nominated Sigourney Weaver) a woman who dedicated her life to the study and protection of the gentle giants, is our pick. Get it, pick?

So take our primate movie poll, PopWatchers, and tell us your all-time favorite? Or let us know in the comments section below if your favorite monkey movie, like Curious George, Congo, or Project X, was left out.